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Video of Pat Buchanan.
 

Tavis: This will be easy, introducing this guy. He's been around long enough; you know him. Former presidential candidate, worked in the Nixon White House, and for that matter, for other presidents as well, and advised all sorts of presidents and commentator on a variety of networks, most recently on MSNBC, and now the author of another book. How many books is this Pat?

Pat Buchanan: Seven, that's number seven.

Tavis: Number seven, Patrick J. Buchanan, 'Where the Right Went Wrong'. I love that title, nice to see you. Where they did not go wrong, you and I were talking about it before we came on the air here. This week, the Republicans had a convention that was very organized. They pulled this thing off. I was a little leery initially when I heard they were going to pick New York. I understood what the point was, the backdrop, the setting, 9/11. A little scared that it might not work, that people might see it as exploiting 9/11, but it seems to have worked from my perspective.

Buchanan: Oh, I think they've handled it terrifically; and the first guy up there is Rudy Giuliani. You can't knock him for getting up and talking about 9/11, the definitive moment that made him a national hero. And frankly, I think it was an element of risk, frankly because of the demonstrators, but I think they have done a terrific job in terms of that. I don't think they've exploited it. They have said, look, this is where the war on terror, which is the central reason for the continuation of the Bush Presidency, this is where it began. Tavis, I think they've done an excellent job so far at this convention, and the last night or tonight, you've got the president, and we heard from Zell Miller, and he had a very moderate progressive speech there, I thought, didn't you?

Tavis: Yeah, moderate progressive. Let me--

Buchanan: That reminded me of me back in '92.

Tavis: You said that, not me. Let me throw a few names out at you before I get to this book, 'Where the Right Went Wrong'. Let me ask you your thoughts on a few names. You already mentioned Rudy Giuliani. Monday night, was the combination of Giuliani and McCain affective?

Buchanan: I think it was very affective. The only drawback to that, it wasn't on national TV. See, instead they were on cable TV. Cable audiences were huge for cable, but I think it would have been extraordinarily effective if Rudy Giuliani had given that speech and all three of the major networks had covered it, because it was tremendous in terms of his praise for the president in the war on terror, and he did a good job of mocking, ridiculing Kerry. It wasn't as hard and blunt as last night's, but it's too bad it wasn't on national TV.

Tavis: Did you think that Laura Bush was effective? And if you think she was effective, what was she supposed to be effective at? I'm not sure I got that.

Buchanan: Well, I think what they're doing is you had Mrs. Kerry up in Boston, and they want to present a contrast. She's, you know, someone said, you know, they wanted to know what was the most famous phrase or most repeated phrase to come out of the Boston Convention, was it, 'Help is on the way?' And by five to one, people said the most rememberable phrase was, 'Shove it'.

Tavis: 'Shove it', yeah.

Buchanan: And so, that's not middle-American lady. And so, you put up Laura Bush who's an enormously popular, and universally popular, put her up as a dramatic contrast, do it indirectly, and it's a smart thing to do.

Tavis: We joked a moment ago about Zell Miller. Was Zell Miller across the line? Was he borderline mean-spirited? Was his attack just a little too virulent?

Buchanan: Well, not for me. I thought, I love the red meat speeches at conventions. I go back to the days of Walter Judd at the Republican Conventions, getting up there and Bill Jenner and those fellows, and so I think it was fine. He's a Democrat. He obviously believes deeply. He's an ex-Marine. He's a tough guy. And he's really letting them have it on national defense. It's fine. I think it's fine to go there. If folks want to say that's over the line, American people saw the whole thing. Let them judge. I'll tell you what it did. It really energized this base, it lit up this convention, which hasn't been getting much red meat because it's got all these progressives and moderates up there. And they brought out Zell Miller and he delivered. He was peeling the paint off the walls.

Tavis: But yet, what was funny to me was, here's a Democrat who was more aggressive than the moderate Republicans, if you will, who they had featured all week long.

Buchanan: He's got immunity. You see, people come up and they say, you know, why did Zell Miller say it. We say, we've got no control over him. He's a Democrat.

Tavis: Yeah.

Buchanan: And so you put him out there to do all that good work.

Tavis: Yeah. Let--John Kerry cannot win the house, can't win the White House that is, without the South. Democrats need to learn how to carry the South. Bill Clinton was effective at that, but you can't win without the South. What did a Southerner, a white Southerner, a white Southern Democrat, how effective was that in making it more difficult for Kerry and Edwards to actually carry the South?

Buchanan: It's enormously effective in this sense, Tavis. Every since Goldwater, and I worked for Nixon, who did very well with African Americans, he got 25 percent in the South, 18 nationally. Republicans have lost the Black vote completely. It's 90/10 in every election. So you've got to energize the white Southern conservative base. And you do that with Christians and you do this with their conservative patriotism issue. And Zell Miller was right down the line on that. He is an ex-Marine, as you pointed out there. They love the idea of standing behind the troops in battle. And so you go after Kerry on all those issues. He's a wimp on defense, you know, the guy has voted against every weapon system. It is a tremendous boost for the Republicans in the South and of course, you've got that good Southern accent up there. Everybody recognizes it.

Tavis: All right, so enough about, enough about Kerry. Where did the right go wrong, Pat Buchanan?

Buchanan: I don't think we should've gone into war in Iraq. We went and invaded a country that didn't attack us, didn't threaten us, didn't want war with us, had no role in 9/11, had no weapons of mass destruction, and I think the president was sold on that, by a group called the neoconservatives. I'm an old school conservative. I believe that Washington--

Tavis: They used to call you a neo-con, didn't they?

Buchanan: No. I was never called a neo-con. I've been called a lot of other stuff, but a neo-con, you know, I can give you a list of a good eight or nine good names.

Tavis: And that's okay, this is family television. This is family television.

Buchanan: No, but what, you know, and they sold it to him, Wolfowitz and these others and this small cabal, which I used to work with during the Cold War, but they believe in empire and global hegemony and America imposing it's views and values on other countries, Democratic world revolution. That's not America. We shouldn't intervene in countries or wars that are none of our business and where we're not attacked. So I think the president made a terrible mistake there. Frankly, if he loses this election, it's because those people sold him on this war. They said it would be a cakewalk. And we'd be welcomed with flowers, and democracy is going to break out. That's nonsense. You can't go over into another country and another culture, a 1,500 years old Islamic and try to, you know, convert the Middle East into the Middle West.

Tavis: Well, the Bush argument, as you well know, is that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. He was a danger to the world. We had to hit him before he hit us. You know the story.

Buchanan: Let me tell you, look. Saddam Hussein was decimated in the Gulf War. We knocked out his Air Force, his Navy, decimated his Army, took out half his tanks, and destroyed the Republican Guard. He had sanctions for 10 years. No new tanks coming in, no new equipment, you really think he was a threat to the United States of America with an economy not even one percent of ours? Tavis, we flew 40,000 sortees over his country, bombing, attacking his radars. He didn't shoot one plane down in 10 years, and this is a threat to the United States of America? The Turks didn't want us to go in, but if he's a threat to us, certainly he's a threat to Turkey. They didn't want us to go in. The Iranians didn't want us to go in. Saudis didn't want us in. Jordanians didn't want us in. If he doesn't threaten them, how does he threaten the greatest nation on earth?

Tavis: I have two quick questions. One, tell me then why you think Mr. Bush did go into Iraq? And number two, it occurs to me, listening to you talk, that I assume you want Bush to win more than Kerry. If Bush didn't have the war on terrorism to run on, he wouldn't have anything to run on. That's his calling card.

Buchanan: Well, look. The war on terrorism is one thing. The war in Iraq, I separate that.

Tavis: Okay.

Buchanan: I think, look. When you went into Afghanistan and you went after Al Qaeda, everybody is behind you. Run that so and so down. Kill him, Osama and everybody with him. Track them down all over the world wherever they are. If they're in the Sudan, and the Sudan won't let you go in, strike them with a predator. But what in heavens name are you doing invading Iraq? Osama bin Laden isn't in Iraq. I mean, he hated Saddam as a secular despot who's crushed Shites and religious fundamentalists. So I think this was a distraction. The president thinks it is part of the war on terror. That's where we disagree. I think we've inflamed the Arab world. We certainly inflamed the Iraqi people. We've got 1,000 Americans dead, 5,000 wounded, 20,000 Iraqis dead. What have we got? We got ourselves a morass in Mesopotamia.

Tavis: Never mind this election for the moment. What does it mean that because of the way we did this, and because of the way we have now changed our passive military engagement to one of, essentially, preemptive strike, we think you're going to hit us, we hit you first. What's that done to America around the world?

Buchanan: Well I think the Iraq war, in particular, I think it has exacerbated relations, and frankly, I predicted it Tavis. I said, first what you're going to get is you go in there and you win the war and then you'll inherit your own gigantic West Bank. And from Morocco to Malaysia, you will have Imams in Mosques calling us the great Satan and calling for jihad against the United States. America's reputation and the president's standing in that part of the world, according to the president of Egypt, who is a friend, has never been lower. And I think we've created, you know, a spawning pool for future terrorists by invading Iraq. I think it was a mistake. I hope the president is coming out. I believe he is, and I hope he'll get rid of all these individuals that I identify in that book, as the neo-cons who walked him up that primrose path.

Tavis: I've got 20 seconds left. Tell me why then, after that statement, George W. Bush deserves to be re-elected.

Buchanan: Because Kerry is wrong on everything. I can't think of a single issue in which I agree with him. I agree with Bush...as--on taxes, on values, on sovereignty, and with you, Tavis, on neoconservatives Supreme Court justices like Scalia.

Tavis: Yeah. That was the best line of the week. Because, if you believe that, I've got some swampland in South Central L.A. right next to my studio that I want to sell you. Pat Buchanan is the author of, 'The New York Times' best selling author of the new book 'Where the Right Went Wrong-How Neoconservatives Subverted the Reagan Revolution and Hijacked the Bush Presidency.' Pat Buchanan, nice to see you.

Buchanan: You take it easy Tavis.

Tavis: Thank you for coming on.